


Rainbows In The Dark

by TelepathicTeaTime



Category: Star vs. The Forces Of Evil
Genre: F/M, Pre-Canon, happy and fluffy, until it's not
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-07-07
Updated: 2016-08-18
Packaged: 2018-07-22 05:08:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 19,586
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7421161
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TelepathicTeaTime/pseuds/TelepathicTeaTime
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Before she came to Earth, before she got her wand, Star was a rebellious princess with a demon boyfriend named Tom. </p><p>And things were happy then.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Girls Night Out

**Author's Note:**

> I was kinda frustrated by the lack of StarTom in this fandom, and by the lack of history between them provided in the show, so I decided to write what I think their relationship was myself! Everything from their first meeting to their eventual break-up. Let's all suffer together!

Star Butterfly hadn’t wanted to go to the concert that night, not really. What she had really wanted to do was what she did best; which was finding a group of ugly, smelly monsters and beating the stuffing out of them! Getting some ice cream afterwards would have been nice too. But her best friend had other plans.

“Come on B-flyyyyyyy!” Ponyhead sang as she zipped around Star’s mess of blonde hair, leaving clouds of glitter in her wake. “This is gonna be so much fun!  _ The _ concert to be at! Wooo!”

Ponyhead’s explosive enthusiasm was something that Star loved most about her best friend. It made things fun, it made things  _ exciting.  _ It’s what made them click so well as besties. But today...she really wasn’t feeling it.

“I don’t know, Ponyhead.” Star sighed, pushing her black sunglasses up her nose to avoid her friend’s pointed stare. “My mom’s been so...so…”she clenched her fists in her metal pleated skirt, unsure if she was grasping for the right word to describe her mother’s constant criticism of her or getting ready to swing at the mental image of her disapproving scowl, her judging eyes. Star decided on the latter, and leapt up with a fierce uppercut, her fist cutting inches close to her bestie’s horn.

Unfazed, Ponyhead simply kissed her lips at Star, who had continued to punch and kick at the empty air, whether at imaginary monsters or her mom it was hard to tell. “Okay, okay okay, I totally get it Star, I totally do! You need to  _ punch  _ something.” Ponyhead flicked her pink mane and fixed Star with a smug grin. “But what if I told you you could punch people and not get in trouble at this very concert? How about that, girl? Huh? Does that sound good or what?”

Star stopped her ferocious assault to regard her friend with a dubious stare over her shades. “What’chu talking about, Ponyhead?”

Snickering, knowing she finally had her friend hooked, Ponyhead lolled out her tongue to reveal a poster for the night’s show, slightly damp and wrinkled from the confines of her mouth. Ignoring the drool, Star picked it up and examined it a little more closely, her blue eyes wide and curious.

**MARCELINE & THE SCREAM QUEENS!!! TONIGHT ONLY!!!**

The poster screamed in bold grungy letters, not so different than the graffiti found in the alleyways of Mewni. A picture of the band lay below, and Star drank in their coolness. There was a blue oozy ghost on drums, a normal looking fella on keyboard, a fluffy-haired vampire on guitar and...their leader, an incredibly confident and stylish looking vampire on bass. 

“So cool…”Star breathed, eyes shining as bright as her name. Some text at the bottom of the page caught her attention and she quickly scanned it over.

**GET READY FOR THE MOSH PIT, SHAKAH BRAH’S!**

Puzzled, Star looked at Ponyhead and gave the poster a shake. “What’s a… mosh pit? It sounds kinda gross. Like an arm pit.” She crinkled her nose in disgust. “And you know I do  _ not  _ like arm pits!”

“Oh girl, hush!” Ponyhead rolled her eyes, but couldn’t help but chuckle. It was hard not to find Star’s naivete endearing, it was downright cute. She turned back to the mirror where she was  applying mascara with her horn’s magic and explained, “A mosh pit is basically a giant fight, B-fly. But like, set to music, you know?”

Star considered this carefully, the hearts on her cheeks twitching in thought. “So like...punch dancing? Dancing with my fists?”

Ponyhead nodded sagely, “Mmmm-hmmm! So this is even better than just  _ fighting  _ monsters like we always do, Star. You feel me? This is fighting and dancing  _ combined! GETTING DOWN AND THROWING DOWN!” _

All of Mewni jumped as a high pitched squeal rolled over the land, cracking glass and wilting crops in its wake. It sounded suspiciously like their princess…

“PONYHEAD!” Star screamed, now scrambling around the chaos of her room to find her leather jacket and spiked boots. “WE HAVE TO GO TO THIS CONCERT! WE HAVE TO!” She was breathing heavily, her mind reeling at this new discovery of mosh pits. Fighting  _ and  _ dancing? Those were two of her absolute favorite things, and she often found herself debating to do one or the other on a daily basis. All along there had been a way to do both! There was so much time to be made up for! So much to-

“Heeeey, wait.” Star looked up from her search for a mosh appropriate outfit with a confused pout. “Where is this concert anyways? I haven’t even seen anything about it until now. This would have been all over the kingdom, right?”

Ponyhead did not respond right away. And after years of being besties, Star knew a quiet Ponyhead usually meant a  _ lot  _ of trouble.

“Ponyheeead?” 

Nothing. Star stalked a little closer to the floating unicorn, who was applying more and more mascara in an effort to dodge the question. Her lashes were as thick and black as tarantula legs, but she showed no sign of stopping, or answering Star for that matter.

“Ponyhead. Hey. Where is. The concert?” Star poked her friend sharply with each word, knowing she wouldn’t keep quiet for long. It just wasn’t in her strong suit. But to her surprise, Ponyhead only pursed her lips, and began to apply a glittery, sugary lip gloss. But those lips were trembling, and Star knew she would spill the beans with just one more push...

Star leaned in close to the unicorn’s ear, pink mane tickling her nose and drawled as sweetly as she could, “Ohhhhhh~ Ponyyyyy~”

“OH MY GOSH STAR, THE CONCERT IS IN THE UNDERWORLD OKAY? THE UNDERWORLD. JEEEEEZ! NOW WOULD YOU STOP BREATHING IN MY EAR, GOOOOOOSH!”

Ponyhead snapped, sprinkling Star’s face with glitter and unicorn drool. She groaned, and shaking her head (whole body?) turned back to face the mirror.

Star was not taken aback in the least by her friend’s outburst, tormenting each other like that was the norm for them, but-

“The Underworld?!” Star threw her hands up in disbelief, and stomping her foot in annoyance, could only repeat, “the Underworld?!”

The Underworld was in a whole other dimension! And the only way to travel to different dimensions, was with a pair of Dimensional Scissors, which they definitely did not have. Her father owned a pair, sure, but he kept them locked up far from Star’s reach, and even more so, under the Queen’s ever icy gaze. Star had often fantasized about sneaking off with the blades, and all the adventures that could be had with them, but had never made the actual attempt to take them. If she was caught, what if her parents decided not give her the wand on her fourteenth birthday coming up in a year? What if they sent her to...Saint O’s?

A shrill scream erupted from Star’s throat, and she went to collapse into a ball of panic when Ponyhead slapped her back to reality with a flick of her mane.  _ Wap! _

“Wooow B-fly, get it together will you? Have some faith in yo gurl!” Ponyhead tsk’d, assuming Star’s reaction was about the concert alone. She raised her eyebrows deviously as Star pulled herself back together, her brows knitted in a question. “I have...a way.”

“A...way?” Star repeated as she re-adjusted her sunglasses.

“A WAY TO GET AWAY!!!” Ponyhead whooped in sudden hysterical delight, and once again poked out her tongue to reveal-

The land of Mewni once again took  pause as another shriek cut through the air. The princess seemed to be having an exceptionally exciting day….

“INTERDIMENSIONAL SCISSORS?!”

Star could hardly believe her own eyes. Right there, nearly glowing against the pink of her friend’s tongue, was an actual pair of interdimensional scissors! 

The shock took her a minute to understand words again, her mouth babbling noiselessly for a few fish-like seconds, but then the sight truly sank in and they exploded from her mouth all at once.

“Omigosh these are real! How did you get them? Are they your dad’s? Does he know? How did you do it? Were you scared? Are you scared? Will we get caught?”

Ponyhead only smiled smugly as Star rambled on and on, getting more animated with each question she posed. One second she was bouncing boot to boot, the next shaking her fists in excitement, then shaking Ponyhead by the neck. It was only when Star began to actually foam at the mouth that the Unicorn princess decided to cut in.

“Okay girl, lemme tell you-”

Star silenced at once, nearly nose to nose with her best friend as to not miss a single detail. The foaming had subsided, but her eyes were still shining as bright as spotlights.  Ponyhead laughed and nudged her away with her face.

“Okay, to answer all your questions- Yeah girl, of course they’re real! What kind of princess do you take me for? And yee-auh, of course they’re my Dad’s, but not right now they ain’t! They’re ooour’s! Ha! And of course he don’t know that, and he ain’t going to because we are too smart and sneaky for that! And psssh, me? Scared? Come on B-fly, you know me better than that.”

“Sorry…”

“It’s cool, it’s cool, it’s cool girl!  _ Anyway… _ ” Ponyhead inhaled deeply, and Star leaned in close, ready to hear the juicy details of how her best friend managed to swipe something as important as interdimensional scissors, wow she still couldn’t believe it! When-

**_Rrrrrriiiiip!_ **

Ponyhead cut a large rip into the fabric of time space right in the middle of Star’s room, and looked at her expectantly. “Anyway, the details don’t matter right now, because the show seriously starts in like, fifteen minutes, girl. So you coming to jam with me or what? Come on now!”

Star stared fixedly at Ponyhead, who hovered partially in her room, partially in the Underworld. Ponyhead blinked back with her heavily made up lashes. There was a beat of silence, a rarity when the two princesses were together.

“Fifteen minutes?!” Star dashed into the portal past Ponyhead, hooking her arm about her neck and dragging her along with her. “Come on, Ponyhead! What are you waiting for?! I have to get the best spot in the pit!”

The portal closed behind them, their screams of excitement echoing off the decorated walls of Star’s now empty room.


	2. The Princess At The Rock Show

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Star goes to her first mosh pit and gets a bit carried away...luckily, she's not the only one.

When the two princesses arrived at the venue where the concert was being held, the place was already packed... _full of demons._

As far as Star was concerned, demons were just as bad as monsters were. They were practically the same thing, only in a way, worse! Where monsters were bigger, more brutish, and would attack just about anyone or anything, demons were _cowards._ They were smaller than monsters, but smarter, never preying on anyone they couldn’t outsmart or manipulate. Star found it pathetic, only choosing victims that were dumb enough to fall for their tricks like that! At least monsters gave their opponents a chance to fight back, actually face their threat.

_‘Monster or demon, I’ll kick their butts and win either way!’_

Star bristled as they wove their way through the demonic crowd, past glowing eyes and crooked claws, pointed fangs and leathery wings. She kept her arms locked tight at her sides, her hands clenched into even tighter fists, ready to swing at a moment’s notice. Passing by a reptilian demon with an exceptionally toothy and not very kind smile, she felt grateful that she had worn her spiked boots, which were sure to lend an extra bite to her already painful kicks.

Ponyhead, sensing the how tense her friend had become, rolled her eyes and nudged her with her face. “Aw, come on B-fly! Be cool. Save it for the pit, yeah? We are here to have some fun, remember?! Wooo-!”

The tension in Star broke as Ponyhead whooped excitedly in her ear, and she couldn’t help but laugh at her friend’s enthusiasm. She looked around once more at the crowd bustling around them, and smirked. Sure, there were a lot of demons and monsters around, but she knew there wasn’t a single one of them she couldn’t beat in a fight. Especially not with her bestie by her side-

Who was no longer by her side.

“Ponyhead?” Star balked at the empty space where her friend had been floating moments ago, craning her neck this way and that in an effort to spot the familiar shock of pink and teal that was the floating unicorn princess. “Ponyhead!?”

“S-she was just right there!” Star sputtered, whirling in confused circles as annoyed demons shoved past her to get closer to the stage. She snatched a demon with nine fox tails walking past by his lame suspenders, dragging him nose to snout with her. “Where is Ponyhead, demon?!” She snarled, giving him a rough shake to show she meant business.

The fox demon adjusted his large glasses with a scoff. “Um, Ponyhead? I don’t listen to any band with a wiki page…”

Star gaped at him in repulsion, than shoved him away. “Useless!” She spat, and began to burrow her way deeper into the foul-smelling crowd, crying out for her bestie and shoving any creature who got in her way.

“Ponyhead! Ponyhead! Pony-” she gasped. “There she is!”

The unicorn princess was up against the wall beside a hulking beast of a minotaur, who did not look so big and scary as Ponyhead fluttered her eyelashes at him. When she flicked his nose ring with the tip of her horn and screamed with laughter, he looked more mouse than bull.

With a chuckle, _“Typical Ponyhead!”,_ Star began to push her way over when the lights suddenly cut, and the densely filled room filled with screams. Star’s fists were up on reflex, and she tensed, ready for anything, when a single spotlight brightened the stage. A hush fell over the room as a bat flew into it’s bright light, its wings sharp and black. It hovered there in the light for a moment, as if judging the crowd, and then with a crack of lightning and a plume of red smoke, it vanished. Star watched with fascination as the crimson fog swirled in the light, then quickly began to recede, as if being pulled into a vortex. Only, it wasn’t the smoke being sucked away...it was the actual _red color_ in the smoke!

Completely spellbound at this point, Star watched as the red drained from the smoke, leaving only a gray haze in its place, and the crowd began to buzz in anticipation. There was suddenly a loud, crazed howl piercing the air, followed by a manic cackle, and the room absolutely exploded into chaos.

“Marceline! Marceline! Marceline!” The crowd screeched and cheered so loud and with such devotion, Star felt the three syllables pounding in her veins, in her skull, in her heart. _Mar-ce-line! Mar-ce-line! Mar-ce-line!_

“Ahh ha ha ha! That’s right! Scream! _Screeeam!”_ came a woman’s devilish voice from the stage, and the crowd complied, finding some way to amplify their already piercing cries to an even more feverish pitch. “Scream for your queen! Scream for Marceline the Vampire Queen! Scream for…”

The whole stage exploded into lightning hot brightness, and through her squinted eyes, Star could see everyone from the poster up on stage. It was…

“ _Marceline and The Scream Queens!”_

And in that moment, Star found herself in the very place she wanted to be all along. As Marceline began to shred on her bass, the bodies surrounding the Mewni princess began to swarm and push, pulling her in its motion.

“Oh my gosh!” Star squeaked, clapping her hands together happily as she was pushed to and fro, the current of bodies becoming increasingly more violent as the opening song progressed. “Is this,” she paused to duck a wild flung arm that would’ve knocked her shades right off, “Is this the mosh pit?!”

A green demon with a three-pronged tongue gave her an especially harsh shove, and snickered as she stumbled over her feet and nearly underfoot. “It ssssure is, lil girl!” He hissed, his friends laughing as he jostled her some more. “Don’t get sssssquished now, hahaha!”

Star pushed back back the waves of hair that had flopped into her face , _‘I really need to find a headband to keep this all back!’_ she thought with a huff, but fixed the reptilian jerk with a smile as sweet as syrup. Her cheek hearts glowed dimly with her barely suppressed thirst for violence as she chirped, fist cocked back, “Don’t worry, I won’t! But youuuu might~!”

_Ka-pow!_

Pitch-fork tongue went sailing through the air, landing in a tangle of limbs with a few other piters with a crash. His friends snapped their necks to growl at Star, who was bouncing on her feet and waving her arms high in the air.

“Woo!” She cheered, bubbly with giggles. “Ponyhead was right! This  _is_ fun!"

When one lunged for her with claws extended, she simply snatched his wrists and spun them both in a do-si-do, laughing with her whole gut as she lifted him off the ground and crashed him into the ceiling, his feet dangling over the crowd’s heads.

At this point, The Scream Queens had launched into an even faster song, the drums booming like bombs, the guitars screaming. The pit seemed to absorb the savage energy, and began to thrash even harder than before. Star Butterfly especially so.

Eyes closed to feel the thrumming music, she punched and kicked wherever the rhythm took her. A right hook here, a low sweep there, a suplex to end a drum solo...Star allowed the music to move her body like an especially vicious puppet as the songs played on. She lost herself in it completely, and smiled the whole way through. She had never danced so well, had never fought so well! She was thinking of how she’d have to add all of the Scream Queen’s music to her MewnI-pod for when her and Pony went out to fight monsters, how much better of a beating they’d all get when she was feeling the music. She could practically hear them begging her to stop already. It was actually amazing how clearly she could hear someone screaming at her to stop!

“Wow,” she mused with a chuckle and a wiggle of her hips, “it’s almost like someone is actually telling me to-”

“ **_SSSSSSSTTTTOOOOOOOOOPPPPPP!”_ **

The horrible shriek that assaulted her ears, worming its way into the very stardust of her bones, was frightening enough to make even the fearless Star Butterfly freeze mid-dance with a yelp. Shocked back into reality, she realized that the entire venue had gone dead silent and still, save for one pitiful whine from an onstage amp. Everyone was looking at her, their jaws agape in shock and terror...well, almost everyone. The ones who lay in limp, unconscious heaps (and from Star’s quick calculations, that was most of the crowd…) around her feet weren’t looking at much at all save for the inside of their eyelids. The stare she felt the most, though,  the only one she returned, was the seething one belonging to Marceline the Vampire Queen herself. Who had also been the one to emit the terrible scream.

She looked less like a vampire lady now and more of an angry, writhing mass of black tentacles, which were all pointed at Star’s shaking form like daggers. Her eyes had shrunken beady and white, glowing hot and angry like dying suns, and her two fangs had given way to rows upon rows (no mattered how hard she squinted, Star could not see an end to them…!) of razor sharp teeth. A pink, chewy looking girl was frantically petting one of Marceline’s tentacles, desperation cracking her voice as she cooed over and over, “Marcy, easy Marcy! Easy Marcy...Marcy!”

It didn’t seem to be doing much good, and Star swallowed hard. “Uhhh…” She stalled, eyes ticking around nervously from the crowd, to the tentacle monster, to the teeth and blood she had spilled all over the ground, and back all over again. “Oops?”

 **_“BOTH OF YOU….”_ ** Marceline hissed, and Star snapped to attention.

“Both? What?”

Someone had spoken at the same time she did, and she spun around to see a horned demon boy staring back at her, all _three_ of his eyes mirroring the same shock and confusion she felt in her own. A flicker of light caught her eye, and she followed it to… ! His hands, which were also squared up for a fight, were completely _aflame!_ Mouth agape, she looked slightly past him to find his side of the pit in similar condition to her’s , if not a little bit more... _charred._ Some of the unconscious forms on the ground still singed  in places, and Star recognized the fox demon from earlier, every tip of his tail burning like a birthday candle.

She nodded once, numbly. But impressed. “Nice.”

He had been surveying her destruction as well, his hands now only smoking at the tips of his fingers, and returned the gesture. “Pretty good.”

 **_“GEEEEEET OOOOOOOOOUTTTTT!”_ ** Marceline howled from the stage, the command sounding less like a scream and more like the destruction of an entire universe. The whole band had joined the pink girl in trying to restrain Marceline, but even their combined efforts didn’t seem like it would keep her from tearing them to shreds for long.

Star looked at the demon boy, and he looked back at her. And maybe it was the sense of impending doom, or the embarrassment of being children called out in an entire venue of cooler older kids, but they found themselves clutching for the other’s hand, and bolting out the door and as far away as the venue as they could _together,_ running faster than either one had ever done before.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for checking back in on Rainbows In The Dark! Chapters will be updated every Thursday!
> 
> Next week, Star and her new friend (or is he foe?), get to know each other a little better


	3. Talking To Strangers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Her mother has lectured her over and over again that a princess must never talk to strangers, but Star knows better. Strangers are just friends you haven't met, even if the stranger in question is a three-eyed demon boy with charm up to his horns.

“So, um...looks like we might have gotten a little carried away back there, huh?”

Star looked up at the demon boy she had just destroyed a major show with, had just blindly given her hand and ran away with. She wasn’t sure how long they had actually been running, but at least for a good long while. Her endurance was something to behold even on a lazier day, but with the added adrenaline of what had gone down at the concert...they must have been miles away from Marceline’s wrath.

Or so she hoped anyways.

She smiled thinly at her newest fri- _ companion. ‘Demons aren’t friends, Star! You know that!’  _ she chided herself mentally, and blew some stray hair from her face with a huff. “Oh, yeah. Maybe a  _ little.  _ Just... _ ”  _ She pinched her fingers together for emphasis, “a little bit.”

He chuckled from the alley wall where he leaned beside her, his arms crossed over his chest. His hands had been trembling terribly when they finally ran out of breath and decided to stop here in the alley, and the tips of his fingers had been glowing slightly like dying embers too, ready to flare up again at a moment’s notice, but Star noticed they were doing neither now. There was even an almost pleasant look on his gray face in lieu of the terrified one she had first seen him with, one small fang poking out from his smile. The dude seemed to cool down fast…

“Oh! I’m Tom, by the way!”

Star nearly broke his wrist as he thrust one of those very hands into her face in greeting, just barely stopping herself from making the proper snap in time as he yelped in surprise. 

“Sorry, sorry!” She quickly threw her own hands up in peace, but kept her eyes trained carefully on his as he cradled his wrist. “Just…y’know...”

He followed her gaze to his hands, and a shadow passed over his face, taking his grin along with it. With a _tsk,_ he shoved them deep into the pockets of his tattered shorts and turned from her, suddenly as cold as the night around them. "Yeah, I know..." She heard him mutter darkly, seemingly more to himself than her.

Star’s mouth twitched as she stared at the back of his spiky, pink head, completely irritated. What did he expect? She barely knew anything about him, this  _ Tom ( _ if that was even his real name!) except that he was a demon with fiery hands and didn’t seem to see the problem with shoving one right in her face as he had done. What if he had suddenly ignited them, and burnt her nose off? Blinded her? Melted her sunglasses to her eyeballs for all eternity? What if he had-

Star abruptly stopped herself, regarding Tom’s sulking form a little more softly. But he  _ hadn’t.  _ He had done nothing but offer his hand in greeting. In friendship.

‘ _ But he’s a stranger! And a demon at that!’  _ Argued the warrior side of Star’s brain, a voice as cold and sharp as a battle axe. It rumbled from deep within her brain and muscles, powerful in its conviction that monsters and demons were something to be fought, not befriended.  _ ‘He cannot be trusted!’ _

_ ‘How will we ever know if we don’t even give him a chance, though?’  _ Argued another voice within Star, this one as soft and as sweet as starlight. This one spoke from her heart, her soul. It was this voice that made Star so easy to love, let her love so easily in return. This was the voice that, when Star really thought hard about it, brought her the most joy in life. ‘ _ He’s a stranger,  _ exactly _. And strangers…’ _

“Are just friends you haven’t met.” Star finished aloud with a sigh.

Tom shot her a look from over his shoulder, eyes narrowed into suspicious slits. He practically growled at her,  “What did you just say?”

Star took a deep breath, slipped her glasses off  of her nose and into her pocket (honestly, it was night after all…) and fixed her blue eyes on Tom.

Meeting them, his slouched posture immediately perked up, and when he turned to face her fully, Star noticed his ashen gray cheeks were as pink as the hearts on her own. He almost seemed to be in a trance...and if she was being honest, Star thought it was pretty darn cute. Cuter than the glare he had been wearing moments ago, anyways.

She giggled, and teasing him only a little bit, beamed her brightest smile. “Well Tom, it’s nice to meet you!” She stood, and gripping the pleats of her armored skirt, curtsied to him as she had been taught by her mother.

The sight of Tom’s slack jaw and popped eyes  was too much for Star to handle then, and she burst into bright and bubbling laughter, dropping her skirt and twirling with her arms outstretched. “I’m Star Butterfly!” she sang through peals of laughter, spinning up close to Tom so that the tips of their boots touched. “And I’m a soon to be magical princess,” she waved her arm overhead, and winked at the thoroughly baffled Tom, “from another dimension!”

“Y-you’re a...a,” Tom sputtered, the blush in his face having spread to the very tips of his pointy ears, “a  _ princess?” _

Star nodded, stepping back and giving a slight twirl to model her clothes. “Yup. I know I don’t look like it much,” And with all her leather and metal and spikes and unkempt hair, she really didn’t, but that was the exact point she was trying to make her parents, her mom especially so. “But I’m the princess of Mewni, one of the best kingdoms ever! Pretty cool, right?”

She posed with her hands on her hips and nose pointed proudly into the air, waiting for Tom to  _ oooh!  _ and  _ aaahh!  _ and perhaps admire her a little bit more when he...broke into laughter himself.  

“Ahahaha! You’re a princess? Ahahaha!”

She snapped her head in his direction as he howled, feeling only a little taken aback and certainly not... _ annoyed  _ or anything at this drastic change in demeanor, and folded her arms sharply across her chest. “What’s so funny about that? You have a problem, Tom? Because,” She cracked her knuckles loudly, “I can help you solve it if you do…”

From where he had doubled over his knees, Tom quickly waved his hand at her in dismissal and wheezed, “No, no, no! Oh, no! It’s not that at all, it’s just that…” Star jumped at how suddenly he snapped to attention, one arm bent rigidly behind his back, the other crossed across his chest, feet solidly together. His face was still as stone and just as solemn, each eye fixed straight ahead of him on Star.

He was posed in the exact way a...

Star gasped loudly, more of a shout really, and pinwheeled away from Tom with the force of her shock.

One hand clasped over her mouth, she pointed accusingly at him with the other. “Are you a…?”

“You got it.”

“Nuh-uh!”

“Uh-huh!”

“For real?”

“ _ So real.” _

“You’re joking!”

“I would  _ never.” _

Star was shaking her head in disbelief, but a smile was stretching its way across her face, as hopeful as the sun rising on a new day. “You’re really a prince?  _ Really?” _

Tom dropped his regal stance to cross an X over his chest. “Cross my heart, hope to die, stick a needle in…” His top eye winked at Star and she giggled, “ _ All  _ my eyes.”

“Okay, okay, so you’re a prince! I believe you if you believe me!” Star tilted her head at Tom curiously, hands clasped behind her back as she studied him closely with a smirk. “I bet I can guess which kingdom.”

Shaking his head, Tom wagged a black-polished nail at her smugness. “I bet you can’t, Star!”

Hearing him say her name for the first time made Star’s heart flutter for a moment, and the tickling sensation in her chest only made her feel more silly, made her want to tease him more. 

That, and Star Butterfly never turned down a challenge!

“Okay, okay, let’s see…” She wandered back up to him for closer inspection,  _ hmmm _ ing as seriously as she could. She thought of the kingdom tutors she’d suffered through over the years, of their dusty stench and droning voices, and tried to mimic their dull, know-it-all expressions on her own face. It felt ugly and weird, and she quickly dropped it. She didn't want him to see her make a face like that, not when he obviously found her so  _cute._ She chuckled to herself at the thought.

Tom watched her approach with raised brows, and began to fiddle nervously with the gauntlet on his wrist. “What are you doing? Aren’t you going to-”

“SHH-SHH-SHH!” Star flapped her hands in his face to silence him, which worked through baffling him enough to be speechless. “I need to make some observations so that I can make a more calculated guess...duuuh!”

Tom only nodded dumbly in response, and Star flashed him a thumbs up before jumping into her study. It was the first honest look she had really given him since they fled the venue, and she was going to take full advantage of it to figure him out.  _ ‘Friend!’  _ sang her loving heart,  _ ‘Or foe.’  _ muttered her warrior’s brain.

“Well, you got grey skin, except in your face, which is a little pink like your hair now that I’m next to you…” she teased, even though it was true. The corners of Tom’s lips twitched on his blushing face, and she saw that his fangs protruded from gums as black as tar... _ interesting _ . 

She cast her gaze upwards, past his pierced and pointed ears, to rest on... “You also have these cute lil horns!”

Tom’s hand flew from his horns to his mouth, to his horns again, his jaw practically unhinged with shock. “Y-y-you…you think my horns are cute? Really?” he seemed truly and completely flustered at Star’s remark, as if he hoped she was being honest but expected she was only joking. Almost as if she was the first one to ever say such a thing to him and  _ mean it. _

Star could tell that they were an important part of Tom’s identity, much like she and her cheek hearts, and her smile was as genuine as her answer.

“ _ Totally _ ! Kinda makes me wish I had a pair myself, you know?”

Tom offered no response, opting to instead just stare at her with this...look of wonder on his face. He kept his hand cradled against his cheek and chin, and the gesture looked so sweet on him, so... _ angelic  _ for a demon...Star had to look away lest he noticed her own reddening face. “Uhh, a-anyways…” She coughed, and continued to check Tom out…. _ observe Tom closely to make sure he wasn’t a threat!!! _

“Your clothes are definitely pretty cool!”

She wasn’t just saying that because he was wearing clothes similar to her’s either. While both their outfits shared a fair amount of spikes and metal, her clothes were purple as poison and sleek against her scraped knees and bandaged elbows, and his were red as blood and full of tatters and tears. Everything from his shirt to his shorts to his leather jacket were ripped hazardly, and Star could easily picture him hunched over them with shears in hand, cutting them this way and that to achieve the more “edgy” look. She had spent many nights doing the same herself; dyeing dresses black and cutting them short above her knee, driving monster teeth into the toes of her boots to stick out as horns, anything to make it less princess-y in appearance. 

She briefly wondered if, he was really was a prince as he claimed, if he made the effort to dress like this for the same reason she did. As a means to claim some individuality from parents who only wanted a cookie cutter, perfect royal child, a deliberate choice made in a life that offered very little choice at all. A way to say without words, "I'm me! I'm not just some doll to dress up and play with however you want! Let me have a choice!" She pulled her own leather jacket a little tighter around herself, frowning.  

Tom blinked out from his dreamy stupor, his pointed ears twitching. He hadn’t seem to notice her sudden dip in mood. “My clothes? Oh…!”

A devilish grin on his face, he pulled on his ripped tank top to give her a closer look at its design. “You must like this best, am I right?” He asked with a waggle of his brows.

Tom’s voice broke Star from her bleak thoughts, and she regarded the printed star with a smile that lit up her whole face, and gave an enthusiastic nod of her head. “Why Tom!,” she cried in her best bashful princess voice, “ Wearing a star on the night you meet me? It’s almost as if it was  _ destiny  _ we met!” She (only partially) faked swooned, placing her hand against the star, against his chest. She noted how warm to the touch he was even through the fabric, like there was a fire burning within his very body. His heart was also pounding very,  _ very  _ hard.

Star looked up from where her hand still brushed his chest, and found him staring at her with an expression she had never really seen before.

It wasn’t like the hordes of fanboys who waited hour after hour to glimpse her even for a second outside the kingdom, with their frantic eyes and reaching hands, croaking like frogs in a swamp and looking just as slimy.

It wasn’t like the boy her mom assigned as her partner when she was being forced into ballroom dancing lessons, who did not once meet her eyes, did not smile or laugh once through the entire awkward ordeal and made her feel foolish and small.

It wasn’t even like the boy Star had danced the entire night away with a month ago when she was out with Ponyhead at the Bounce Lounge. She had drank in his lingering stares and kind words like a flower soaking up the sun, so eager and so excited about how special he made her feel, only to come back from the bathroom to find him smooching on a faun with flowers in her antlers. Star and Ponyhead had been banned from returning for a  _ month _ after the destruction they caused in retaliation, and had missed out on many a great dance party. It had been pure agony.

Those boys had made Star feel gross, uncomfortable, used, angry... _ sooo angry…. _ and above all, like she was less than Mewnman. 

But looking back into Tom’s eyes (the two level with her’s, anyways), Star felt anything but those terrible things. She felt like...like...there was no one else she rather be than-

“STAR BUTTERFLY!!! THERE YOU ARE, GIRL OMIGOSH!!!!”

Star and Tom screamed in unison at the sudden explosion of glitter and noise, and a near-by trash can burst into flames as Tom threw his hands up into the air in shock.

Ponyhead zoomed around Star in frantic circles, flashes of pink and teal swirling in her vision and making her dizzy. Her high-pitched shrieking seemed to come from every angle as it bounced off the graffiti ridden walls of the alley.

“Where have you been, girl!? Do you have any idea how worried I was? I mean, yeah, I stayed and finished the concert, it was sooooo good girl I cannot believe you missed it! Oh yeah- because you nearly wrecked the whole thing I cannot believe how haaaaard you went in the pit B-fly! Like woooooow~ AND WHO IS THIS CHUMP?!”

Star gasped as Ponyhead backed Tom up against the alley wall with her horn, which sparked and spit magic at him threateningly. His hands, which were up and level with his horns, began to glow and smoke threateningly in return.

“I’m..” he growled through clenched fangs, but Ponyhead cut him off with a crazed whinny.

“NUUUUH-UUUUH, THREE EYES, I ASKED STAR WHO YOU WERE!  _ STAR _ ! MAYBE YOU NEED THREE EARS TOO, BECAUSE YOU DO NOT SEEM TO HEAR-URK!”

Star forced herself between the two, clamping her hand over Ponyhead’s ever-running mouth with a frantic  _shhh!_

“Ahahaha,  _ Ponyhead….”  _ Star laughed in an effort to break the sudden tension that hung in the air, as heavy and dangerous as a guillotine hanging above their heads. It did next to nothing, so she tried again with a little more  oomph.

“ _ HAHAHAHAHA...HAHAHA!…. _ Oh Ponyhead!  _ Classic  _ Ponyhead!” She nudged Tom with her elbow and rolled her eyes, who only continued trading death stares with her friend. “Um, Tom this...beautiful and confident lil rascal is my best bestie in the whole wide world! Ponyhead! And Ponyhead,” Star spun on her heel, so she could wrap one arm around Ponyhead’s neck and present Tom with a flourish of her other one, “This is Tom! We got kicked out of the concert together for causing bodily harm to a majority of the crowd! And now we’re good friends because Tom is actually a really nice guy and not someone you should threaten with your horn like that! Say  _ hiiiii~!” _

Ponyhead pursed her lips together full and tight, her eyes narrowed as sharp as blades. But when she glanced into Star’s eyes and saw them shining with such sincerity, such  _ hope  _ that she’d approve, she looked back at Tom less like he was a murderous fiend and more like a mere dirty hobo. “Um….okay, I guess?” 

Finally she lowered her horn, and Tom was allowed to step back from the wall, whose fists still smoldered as he clenched and unclenched them. When he caught both princesses staring at them pointedly, he closed his eyes and took a long, deep breath, and when he finally opened his eyes again, they had stopped smoking completely.

He offered Ponyhead a smile, which looked only a... _ little  _ forced at the edges, and once again stuck his hand out for a shake. “Hello there, Ponyhead. It’s so... _ nice _ ... to meet you. Any friend of Star must be just as cool as she is, haha...ha.” 

Ponyhead’s gaze flickered between his outstretched hand, to his curled lips and back again, her mouth set in a flat line. “Are you for real, boy? Three eyes, you got three whole eyes! And yet heeeeere you are, trying to shake my hand when  _ I! GOT! NO! HANDS!  _ Are you blind?! I don’t even have a body for-”

She suddenly froze mid-rant, and let out a panicked scream.

“STAAAAAAARRRR! WE DO NOT HAVE TIME FOR THIS!! WE GOTTA GO, I STILL HAVE THE SCISSORS, REMEMBUUURRR?! WE’RE GONNA GET BUSTED IF I DON’T BRING THEM BACK LIKE NNEEEE-OOOWWW!”

Star’s hands flew to her face and she joined her best friend in her panic. “Busted!? Like busted busted, in trouble busted?!! Like get busted and never get my wand and get shipped off to Saint O’s busted?!” Her shriek was so loud, Tom yanked on his ears with a pained expression on his face and stumbled away,  just barely looking up in time to see Star about to hop into a swirling vortex that would take her home, and...away from him.

“Star, wait!” He cried, cringing at the desperation he heard in his voice. He had his hand stretched out towards her, as if he was about to pull her back telepathically. He could've done so easily with his powers, maybe she'd think it was cool? Maybe...

‘ _ Ooooh she isn’t going to stop, she isn’t going to stop, she isn’t going to-” _

“Oh, Tom!”

Star leaned back out of the portal, her eyes wide with apology. “I’m so sorry to rush off like this as midnight, so stereotypical princess like, right? But I really do have to go!” She said this all in one rush of breath, and then took a deep gasping breath. When she spoke again, her voice was much softer, much sweeter. “But...I’m really glad I got to meet you tonight.” 

He was too far away, and the swirling colors of the portal too strange on her face, for him to tell if he was imagining the blush on her cheeks and nose or not. “You…”he took a hesitant step forward, then another. He was hoping to walk into the right words to say, anything that'd keep her there even a second more. “You, uh...never guessed which kingdom I’m from?”

Star blinked at him in surprise, as if she had been expecting him to say something else instead ( _ ‘But what?’)  _ but then gave him a cheeky smile.

“Ha! Looks like you’re just gonna have to wait for my answer until we hang out again, Tom!”

He offered her a bright smile back, and found himself stepping even closer to where she waited to jump back home. “Well, uh, I’m actually not too patient of a demon, Star.” He slowly reached his hand out towards hers. “I hate to wait…”

She giggled, and quick as could be brushed her fingertips against his, a shock of electricity in his skin where there was usually flame.

“Then I’ll see you real soon!” And with a wink, she was through the portal and gone. 

Tom stood there awhile staring at the spot where she had vanished, his ears adjusting to the sudden silence after all the chatter and screaming and laughing that came with being in close proximity to Star Butterfly. It was nothing like the usual sounds of the Underworld, which were filled with agony and suffering and rage. It was so fun, it was so…  _ happy. _

He missed it, missed  _ her,  _ so much already. Here he was, a demon born of fire and flame, and for the first time in his life, he actually felt... _cold._ Like Star had been the first actual warmth he had ever known, and taken it with her as quick as she had brought it. How had he ever lived without it, without her?

 With that thought weighing heavy on his mind, he turned on his boot and began to shamble out of the alleyway, his hand clutching absentmindedly at the star on his chest.

Though his family’s castle loomed oppressive and sharp against the blood-red horizon, over-looking all of the Underworld, Tom still had a long walk home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks again for coming back to Rainbows In The Dark! This chapter was one of my favorite ones to write, and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I did writing it.
> 
> Check in next Thursday for more StarTom goodness!


	4. Mirror, Mirror

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nothing in the universe drives Star Butterfly more crazy than waiting on a boy to call. And if she hopped from one universe to the next? It'd still drive her just as nuts.

“Mirror, mirror on the wall, won’t you show me any missed calls?”

_“No unheard messages.”_

Star Butterfly groaned loudly and flopped back onto her bed, burying her face deep into a pile of pillows on her bed. It was much softer to just hide here than face the harsh truth her mirror had repeated back to her...for the one hundred and twelfth time that day.

It had been an entire _day_ since she had first met Tom at the concert, since they had run away together and spent the hours teasing and laughing together, and he _Still. Hadn’t. Called._

Why hadn’t he called???

There was nothing in the universe that drove Star more crazy than waiting on a boy to call. And if she hopped from this universe to the next? Waiting on a boy to call would _still_ drive her just as nuts.

“And I make it so easy for them tooooo….!” she whined, reaching for a narwhal shaped pillow and clutching it tightly to her chest. “I lay on the princess charm, I let them know I’m interested, I’m cute!” she ticked each reason off of her fingers, curling each one into a fist. “I let them know I want to see them again, and I mean it too!”

Ending with a shout, Star raised her complete fist towards the poor pillow, ready to unleash all  of her anxiety and anger in a flurry of punches and jabs on its smiling whale face, when they suddenly left her a wave, and she collapsed back into the pillow with a sob.

“Am I j-just not cool enough?” She hiccuped, tears rolling past her broken-hearted cheeks. “Maybe he was only pretending he was having fun? Maybe he didn’t even like me at all…”

Snapshots of Tom flashed through her mind, wounding her further. The way he looked at her most of the night, with wide eyes and blushed cheeks. How cute his smile was, curling like flames at the corners and sharp with fangs. The feel of his heart hammering against her palm, his fingers against her's...

Had she really fallen for his charms so easily like that? Was she really so... _dumb?_

Stiffening her lip, Star gave a violent shake of her head, blonde hair poofing out everywhere. _No, no, no, no!_  There was no way she was going to let him have this much of a say on how she felt, especially about herself! She was cool, and strong, and...and the most awesome princess around! If Tom couldn't see that, if he could just forget that so easily then, well...

“Well you know what? Forget Tom! Forget demons, I knew they couldn’t be trusted! If if he was to call me right now,” she crossed her arms tightly across her chest and stuck her nose into the air with a _hmph!_ “I wouldn’t even answer!”

From behind her, she heard her mirror began to shimmer and sparkle. In it's usual monotone voice the mirror announced _“Incoming call from Tom-”_

Star nearly broke the sound barrier at the speed she zipped over to her mirror, a tangle of socked foot over foot and hands smoothing down hair and swiping away stray tears and when she finally cried out to the mirror, “Accept! I accept!”-

The hearts on her cheeks were once again whole and she was positively radiant, the polar opposite of the princess who had just been moping the hours away.

“Hiiii Tom~!” She sang to the demon boy smiling at her from the other side of the mirror, wiggling her fingers at him playfully. “How are youuu~?”

“Star!” Tom beamed back, and Star couldn’t help but adore the way his forehead eye crinkled in joy with his other two eyes. “I was going to call you sooner, but-”

“Oh, Tom! Tom, Tom, Tom! Do not even _worry_ about it!” Star dismissed him with a carefree wave of her hand, chuckling. “I knew you’d call sooner…” Her face suddenly darkened, eyes far away and haunted. “ _Or later…”_

Tom blinked at her in confusion, smiling a bit awkwardly at her sudden shift in demeanor. “Uhh, yeah? Well, uh,” he coughed, then spread out his arms in a grand gesture. “Anyways! You want to get together today? Maybe go cause some trouble?” He lit his hands aflame for emphasis, a wicked look in his eyes. Then looked away sheepishly just as quick, his now cold hands rubbing shyly at his arm. “If you would want to that is…?”

“Trouble, Tom?” Star repeated back incredulously, quirking her brow at him. He seemed to shrink smaller under her gaze, his face beginning to glow as bright as his flames. “You think I, the princess of Mewni, would want to go cause trouble? _With you?”_

Tom was beginning to gnash his fangs together, his shoulders becoming more and more tense with each passing second. “I mean, uh, “ he muttered, barely audible through the mirror, “I-” he jumped back when Star squealed loudly with delight, clapping her hands.

“I WOULD LOVE TO!!!”

His ears, which had been drooping at the tips just seconds ago, immediately perked up with glee, not unlike an excited puppy’s would. “Wait, really? You would?”

Star nodded with so much enthusiasm, it took Tom a moment to realize she was agreeing to his proposal and not headbanging to some music he couldn’t hear. _‘So cute…’_

“So!” He jumped as Star leaned up close to the mirror, smiling with all her teeth and brows raised devilishly. “Where do you want to go cause some trouble? I am allllll about trouble!”

Her hands flit like excited birds in front of her face, as she gushed about all of the possibilities. “We could go steal treasure from salty pirates! Or we could ambush some monsters, kick out their teeth and make pretty necklaces with them, _ooooh_ I love doing that! Or there’s these trolls that spend all day on their computers sending IM’s and stuff, right? We can go and switch all the keys on their keyboard around! That would be so! Much! Fun!”

Finally breathless with the promise of so much opportunity, she looked at Tom and gasped, chest heaving, “What do you think, Tom?”

The demon was rubbing his chin thoughtfully, his eyes closed in careful contemplation of Star’s ideas. He was quiet for a minute, and Star took the chance to peer closely at his face and wonder if he was wearing eyeliner or if most demons had eye markings like his, like wow, she couldn't even get her own make up to look so nice- when he finally opened his eyes and fixed her with a mischievous smile.

“All of it.” He said simply with tented fingers, and Star balked in confusion.

“What?”

Tom opened his hands, his smile only growing bigger. “All of it, Star. We’ll go do _all_ of those things! And,” he paused for dramatic effect,  making her wait for the best part, “I’ll even buy you food after. What do you say?”

Star really did not have so much to say, as she did squeal in response. She threw her head back and laughed in exuberation, her cheek hearts shining with pure delight. “Tom!” She cried, arms clutching at her sides as she hooted and hollered. “Tom, you deeeevil! You really are after my heart, aren’t you? That sounds _awesome!_ ”

Her unbridled joy was contagious even through the mirror, and Tom found himself laughing along with her, his own heart soaring at her enthusiastic acceptance. “Me, a devil after your heart?” He scoffed in feigned offense, turning away as if wounded. “I am but a prince who only wants to spend leisurely time with fellow royalty! My motives are pure!”

They laughed, the flow of conversation much smoother between them compared to the night before. It felt easy for them to laugh together like this, it felt... _right._

“Sooo, Prince Tom, “Star sighed when her laughter had finally bubbled down to a few giggles. “When can this princess expect your escort?”

Tom winked at her, and then- _fwip!_

Ended the call on her…?

Star stared at where Tom’s face had been only seconds ago, finding only her own bewildered reflection looking back at her. She searched the mirror for any sign that Tom was calling back, maybe it was a faulty reflection connection? But none came. Cheeks puffed out in an annoyed pout,  Star prepared to call him back and let him have it. Their first phone conversation ever and he just hung up like that?

“Jeez Tom! What the he-”

A sudden rush of noise and heat behind her back cut her off, and she flipped off the bed with reflexes that came from only years of fighting experience, ready to thrash whoever was foolish enough to try to get the drop on Star Butterfly, only to find Tom’s smiling face peeking at her through a window of flame.

“Heyyyy Star, ready to go?”

She dropped her fists to stare at Tom incredulously, who only gave her a cheeky, fang-toothed grin in return. Other princesses would have been quite offended to have a demon boy open a portal in the middle of their bedroom like that, might have even screamed for their guards or wept over their singed lace curtains smoldering in the window. But if there was one thing Star wasn’t, it was like other princesses.

“Cooool!” She breathed, regarding Tom’s window of flame in amazement. “You can open portals without interdimensional scissors?” She reached out her hand to touch it without thinking, and Tom quickly grabbed her fingers in his to stop her, “Woah!”

“Yeah, I can actually!” Tom’s voice swelled with pride as he grasped her hand fully, his grip as warm as sunshine pooling in Star’s palm, “it’s taken a lot of practice, but I can go just about anywhere now. Or should I say, _we_ can go anywhere _…”_ he pushed the edges of the window down and out, making it into a door. He stepped out of it and offered Star the crook of his elbow, all three of his eyes gleaming in excitement. “Shall we, Star?”

Giggling, Star linked her arm through his, feeling giddy from the roots of her hair to the tips of her toes. She had hung out with boys before, sure, boys that had been at the Bounce Lounge or the arcade at the same time as she and Ponyhead, but she had never actually _gone out_ with a boy all on her own like this. The thought sent a little jolt of electricity through her heart, and she felt her cheeks _zing!_ With the thrill.

She turned her head to see Tom peering at her closely, a small smile playing on his lips. “Do your cheeks usually do that?” he teased.

“Huh?” Star looked over her shoulder into the mirror to see a halo of canaries twittering about her hearts, as golden and sweet as she felt about going out with Tom. “Ahhh! Shoo shoo!” She flapped her free hand at her face and the birds took off at once, vanishing in a poof of glitter as mysteriously as they had appeared.

She shrugged sheepishly at Tom, who only laughed and pulled her a step closer to him, their shoulders cozy against each other. “Okay, okay, that was cute! That was really cute, Star. But now, trouble awaits!”

And before she could offer a response, he whisked them both through the swirls of fire and smoke and into the adventure that was Star Butterfly’s first date.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A little bit of a shorter chapter this week, but no worries- Next week's First Date chapter is quite the doozy of fun and fluff!  
> So thanks again for checking in, and hopefully I'll see everyone next time~!


	5. Dynamics of Demon Dating

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Normally first dates begin with dinner and a movie, but nothing is normal when Star Butterfly's around.

Tom thought he had known what fun was. Fun was something kind of hard to come by in the Underworld, a dimension dedicated specifically to everything that was the exact  _ opposite  _ of it- torture, agony, suffering. It didn’t make it any easier that he was its prince either, and expected to act the way a prince of such a dreadful place should be- cruel, merciless, seething with constant rage. His dad had a funny knack for making sure he felt that way as often as possible, for the “good of the Underworld”, of course.

He tried his best to enjoy himself when he could, though. Practicing his fire magic or telepathy usually calmed his nerves and brought a smile to his face, a sense of pride swelling in his chest whenever he managed a new trick or ability all on his own. He’d sometimes sneak off to the record store when he had the chance to listen to music too, (he liked the music that was loud, dirty,and mean the best, the  _ punk _ music as the bored siren behind the register described it).

Most of all, he loved to fight. It was the only fun he could have without the risk of getting in trouble, really. It was what was expected of him, it was what Tom enjoyed the most, thrashing and burning and breaking any demon foolish enough to defy their prince, anyone who mocked his horns or small stature, or just anyone who plain looked at him funny. It was only when he was fighting that he didn’t just smile, but laugh. That’s what Tom had thought real fun was. 

But now he knew he had been wrong,  _ so wrong _ . Real fun wasn’t just messing around with fire, or listening to gross songs by bands with even grosser names, or beating the snot out of his subjects. No.

Real fun was the time he spent with Star Butterfly, a fact their date had proven irrefutable.

 

They had kicked off the date by fighting monsters. Star had been insistent they did so first, almost scarily so.

As soon as the portal had closed behind them in her room, he had barely opened his mouth to ask where they should head first when she placed a hand on his shoulder and stared intently into his eyes, as serious as he had seen her yet.

“We  _ have  _ to go fight monsters first, okay?”

“Y-yeah?”

The look in her eyes was kind of frightening, and something in the tone of her voice made him want to stand up a little straighter, look a little braver. She had been so cute and bouncy just a second ago...had he already done something wrong to upset her…? 

“ You got it!” He nodded in immediate agreement with her demand, hoping to appease her with his enthusiasm, but she merely shook her own head back at him, unimpressed.

“No, Tom. You don’t get it. This is gonna be like, a test.”

Caught off guard, he did not so much step out of the portal as he did stumble, only catching his balance when Star caught his shoulders. He smiled at her thinly in thanks, brushing off his clothes. “A test, huh? Well…” he tapped a black-polished finger against his head, winking confidently at her. “This prince has a brain to match his good looks!” 

Star only snorted in response (not exactly the swoon he had been hoping for), and gave him a playful punch in the arm. The smile had returned to her face, burning away the serious aura around her as suddenly as mist in the sun, and Tom was left reeling with the whiplash of her mood. “If your brain can punch, Tom, you might just pass!”

“Oh Star,” he sighed, shaking his head with a chuckle, “my brain can do so much more than  _ punch.”  _ And with a snap of his fingers, reduced a near-by tree into a pile of ashes. 

She had only laughed then, and grabbing the crook of his elbow, took off running with him stumbling along in tow. “Then let’s see what you’ve got, hot shot!”

On Star’s enthusiastic recommendation, he had taken them to a stretch of forest within Mewni where she said only the biggest, baddest of the monster population lived.

Tom could see why, it felt a lot like home here. The trees towered tall and ominous over their heads, their gargantuan branches blocking out any of the sun’s warm light and leaving the rest of the wood in dark, uninhabitable shadow. Nothing stirred around them as they made their way deeper in, no bird song, no animal chatter, not even a breeze to churn up the dried leaves at their feet. Occasionally there’d be a crisp snap underfoot, and looking down, Tom found himself not looking at twigs, but bones, licked down to the marrow and riddled with teeth-shaped gouges. He merely shrugged, unfazed. Nothing he didn’t see back in the Underworld, really…

 But for a place that was usually supposed to be teeming with life, with sound and movement, this forest held only the same chilly silence as death itself if not for-

“These monsters are the ugliest too, Tom! Like, make you wanna puke up your breakfast and make you all hungry again ugly!” Star proclaimed as she ducked through trees and flipped over rocks, a blur of blonde hair and swinging fists. She was absolutely exuberant, running in circles around him and turning cartwheels as they searched for their prey. A real shooting Star.

Any other princess might have been fearful to wander such a dreadful place, especially with a demon as their only companion,  but Star seemed like she couldn’t be any more excited. Linking their arms at the elbows, she pulled him this way and that through the trees, bubbling with chatter all the while.

“Tom, look at this skull! There’s still a little bit of eyeball left! Hahaha, ewww!”

“Oh Tom, this is where I tamed my first waricorn! It changed my  _ life,  _ let me tell you-!”

“Tom, Tom! You gotta look at this mushroom! It, heeheehee, it-heeheehee, sorry,  _ sorry _ , it looks like a little butt!”

Listening to her ramble, listening to her laughter as it echoed through the forest around them, Tom felt himself filling with the light she excluded, as warm and sweet as sunshine. He had originally been planning on playing it cool the entire time, hoping to impress her by being suave and aloof, but the more Star joked and ran and spun around him, the light in him only grew brighter, and he found himself acting just as silly beside her, helplessly caught in her carefree orbit.

Using his telekinesis, he picked up skulls to make them chatter like puppets in a mock show, which Star applauded loudly for through peals of laughter. 

“Hey, you know what my favorite instrument is?”

“No, what is it?”

“The trom _ bone!” _

He scrambled up tree branches and leapt from them with Star watching from far below, landing on the ground in a burst of fire and a lame pose to boot. And when she insisted it was her turn to try, he’d watch her plummet through the air, her “Yaaaaay!” only growing louder the closer she came to closer to impact, and then at the last possible second when she’d go from being Star Butterfly to Star Scramble, he’d twirl his finger and  _ fwoop!  _ Land her gently on her feet in a breeze of  glowing embers.

When only a little bit ago she had been so adamant about fighting monsters, the idea had seemed forgotten completely in lieu of simply running through the woods having fun. She didn’t seem to care at all, though, as they tumbled and screamed with laughter. In fact, she seemed like she wasn’t only excited for whatever brawl they might still be walking into, but to just be there with him...just like he was excited to be there with her.

Tom couldn’t help but wonder, but  _ hope…. _ and he decided he might as well try to find out. “Y’know Star, I’m real pumped up for this!” He boasted with clenched fists, giving a few jabs to the empty air around him. He looked at her expectantly to see her rolling in the grass, popping up with a fierce kick that whistled through the air. She hadn’t seemed to have heard him at all, and he tried again a little louder,

“Star! I’m so excited to pummel these monsters with you!” And she looked at him suddenly then, her eyes fixed right on him wide and alert. Encouraged by her complete attention, he continued on more boldly, “Yeah, it’s gonna be real fun to mess these monsters up, especially if they’re as nasty and ugly as you say they are!”

Star was raising her hand at him now, waving it frantically in the air.  _ ‘Oh! Does she want a high five?’  _

Tom jogged up to her with a toothy grin, and slapped her hand with his. “Awesome! Here’s to making their ugly mugs even uglier, am I right?”

“Who are you calling ugly, you three-eyed goat face!? Ruuuuude!”

And suddenly Star was just a blur in his eyes, and the ground was far away, and he was flying _. _

_ ‘How...how long have I been able to fly like this? Without my fire?’’  _ He thought numbly as the wind whistled in his ears, watching the ground rush beneath him, then just as suddenly,  _ up  _ to meet him.  _ ‘Oh, never.’ _

The pain was very loud in his body when he hit the ground, filling what felt like every bone, every claw and tooth in his body with a screaming agony. His chest felt crushed, his nose felt crooked, and from where he struggled for breath in the dirt, even one of his fangs felt loose. That had hurt like home-

“Tom!!!”

He heard Star cry from somewhere far away, followed by a monstrous roar. He latched onto the sound of her scream, that one syllable echoing in his brain over and over. She had sounded so worried. Something had made Star worry, and more than that, something had embarrassed him in front of her. On. Their.  _ Date. _

His blood began to boil like tar within his body, molten and black. The sudden heat began to change his pain into something else, twisting it into something ugly and dangerous, something he could use.

Flames lifted his broken body out from the dirt, welding his bones back together and filling his sore muscles with a new, violent energy. He turned his gaze, which burned white and hot with fury, in the direction he had heard Star’s shout.

She was currently toe to toe with not one, not two, but  _ four  _ monsters, who both dwarfed her in size and boasted claws and fangs where she had nothing but her fists and feet. In all honesty, she seemed completely undaunted by the odds stacked against her, and she faced them with teeth bared and fists held high.

“Hey!!” She snarled at them, in a roar that no doubt put theirs to shame, “You can’t just throw Tom like that!”

One of the monsters, a towering feline looking beast that had swords, actual  _ swords  _ for whiskers, only yowled with laughter in response. “Ohhhh?” It purred, its slit like pupils glinting dangerously at Star. “What are  _ you  _ gonna do it about it, little girl?”

And that was Tom’s cue. Propelling himself forward with a  _ whoosh! _ of heat and flame, he slammed into the beast with all the force and heat of a meteor, sending it flying the same way it had sent him minutes ago. “It’s not what she’s gonna do…” He hissed at the other monsters as he lowered himself beside Star, who was gaping at him in awe. “It’s what  _ we  _ are gonna do.”  

His grin was molten with malice, and Star returned it with a blood-thirsty smile of her own. They nodded in usion, and something just... _ clicked  _ right then between them. Something that felt dangerous, something that felt  _ right. _

They both turned to face the remaining trio of monsters, who suddenly did not seem so big and bad before them. Chuckling, he summoned a ring of fire around them, and when Star took the chance to quip, “Yeah, you monsters are out  _ matched!  _ Haha, get it?  _ Matched?   _ Because Tom here is on fire! Like a match! Hee hee hee~!” he suddenly realized two very important things.

The first was that him and Star were a  completely unstoppable force . The concert had only been the beginning of the havoc they could wreak when they worked together , and he was sure without a doubt in his mind that there would be so much more mayhem to follow if they stuck by each other’s side, like they were doing right now. They shared something special, something Tom had not been able to find in anyone else in the Underworld, in any of the other dimensions for that matter. Not a thirst for violence alone (though it was pretty fun on its own), but a desire to let loose and have fun while they could,  royal responsibility looming like a guillotine over their futures. Only Star, being fellow royalty, must know exactly what that felt like- knowing times like this were something special, something to be taken advantage of fully while they were still available. Before the guillotine, before the crown, came down upon their heads.

And the second thing Tom realized?

Maybe love at first sight didn’t actually exist, but love at first terrible pun certainly did.

“Oohohh ooh, and then the way you went  _ fwoooosh!  _ and turned that morning star-lamander into a mushy s'more? Tom, that was so cool!”

“Not as cool as the way you broke that manpire bat over you knee! The sound of his spine just snapping in two like that? Totally wicked, Star. It was so awesome.  _ You’re  _ awesome.”

“Oh Tom, stop...you’re making my face all  _ bleeegh _ and weird feeling again....hee hee~”

Tom couldn’t help but laugh as Star turned away from him in a fit of nervous giggles, her cheeks boasting little chubby tomatoes in place of their regular hearts. Her blush glowed the same soft pinks and reds as the sunset unfolding before them, and there wasn’t a doubt in Tom’s mind which sight was more beautiful. Especially when she looked up at him through her long lashes and said, in a voice as soft and slow as the clouds drifting overhead, “I had a nice time with you today, Tom….an  _ awesome  _ time.”

They had ended up spending the whole day fighting monsters together,  plans of stealing from pirates and harassing candy trolls completely forgotten in the thrill of the fighting.

The way they moved with each other in battle, she leaving the monsters stunned with her powerful punches and kicks so he could burn them to a crisp, he giving her the openings she needed to land those hits by distracting them with bursts of fire, it was as graceful as a waltz. It was the kind of cooperation that only came from people who were on not just on the same page, but the same exact sentence. Perfect harmony, born from perfect chaos. It really had been a great time...the best Tom had ever had.

“Yeah…” And inhaling so deeply the fire in his lungs flared up hot and bright and sent ashes tickling the back of his throat, Tom reached for Star’s hand (still cute even with her bruised and bloody knuckles, maybe even more so)  and gripped it in his own, careful to keep it from flaring up with his nerves. “It was awesome.”

Star’s face went through a spectrum of emotions at his touch, from absolute shock to sudden anxiety (Was his hand really scarier to touch than the ugly monsters she punched and pummeled?) , and Tom was worried he had screwed up  _ royally ( _ Was she rubbing off on him already..? Oh, man…) when at last, she finally decided on a single facial expression…

_ A smile.  _

She smiled at him so happily, so brightly, he worried for a split second that his heart would melt, the fact it was surrounded by fire all of the time forgotten by his lovestruck brain. This was all he needed to remember, anyways. The feel of Star squeezing his hand back, the way she looked silhouetted against the sunset, her hair flowing like spun gold in the breeze...this,  _ this _ was the only thing worth remembering-

“Hey Tom, don’t you remember? You said you’d buy me some food, remember?”

He snapped from his daze to find Star peering at him expectantly, a pout on her face and her free hand patting her tummy, which he heard growl not unlike the monsters they had been fighting earlier. As the sound was carried away with the wind, she looked at him pointedly and explained, “Fighting monsters makes me sooo hungry! And I when I get sooooo hungry,” She leaned in close, and her smile was no longer sweet and kind, but dangerous, “ _ I get sooooo mad.” _

She didn’t have to warn him twice. With a sheepish chuckle, Tom quickly stood to his feet and helped Star to her’s, keeping their hands together snugly. “Say no more! I know a place that has like, the best fried phoenix wings-

“Fried phoenix wings?! I love those!” Star squealed excitedly. “Especially dipping them in-”

“Mummy Barbecue Sauce!” They exclaimed in avid usion, using their free hand to point at the other.

The two bursted  into laughter that continued as they strolled into the portal that’d take them to dinner, laughter that asted throughout all the hours they sat in the little grungy diner Tom had taken them to, sharing jokes and interests and stories, stuffing their faces in between like the victorious warriors they were, right up until the waitstaff kicked them out an hour after they were already supposed to have closed, the door slamming angry and loud behind them.

Their laughter only died down when he went to drop her off back home, as they stood in Star’s room long after dark, long after curfew.

Tom looked down at her hand, which was still clasped in his own, and frowned for the first time in hours. The motion felt surreal on his face, which ached from all the smiling he had done during the day, and he scratched at his tingling cheeks nervously. “Umm...are your parents gonna be mad? Are you going to be in trouble, Star…?” He thought about what Star had told him about her mother over dinner, lamenting with a mouth full of meteor-tots how she judged her own daughter so harshly, how she seemed to find Star incapable of doing anything right. His grip tightened just a bit, and began to grow hotter to the touch. He only cooled down when Star rolled her eyes and  _ pfff’ _ td through the corner of her mouth, rustling the loose hair around her face.

“When are my parents  _ not _ mad at me?” She sighed, shaking her head. It was true she’d probably have some explaining to do tomorrow, and no doubt she’d get lectured until her brain oozed slimy and bored from her ears, but she didn’t think she’d get grounded anyways. She was kind of old for that sort of thing.  _ Right? _

She gave Tom’s hand a reassuring pat, and then pulled him in for a hug that was as happy and warm as a cute sweater. 

“I know I already said this Tom, but today was awesome! Really, really, awesome!” She chirped in his ear, his cheek warm as glowing coals against her’s. Then, her voice growing mischievous, she sang “Aaaand, I think I’m ready to make my first guess about what kingdom you’re from!”

As he pulled back from her, it was fun to watch all three of his eyes narrow at her in confusion, then just as suddenly pop wide with remembrance. “Oh! Oh yeah! You never did make your guess!”

Even throughout all their conversations that night, Tom had never explicitly said where he was from. He was sure his stories must have provided plenty of clues, though, with rivers of blood and eternal darkness providing the setting to most of his tales, and mentions of public torture and agony peppered throughout. 

Shaking his horned head with a chuckle, he opened his hands to give Star the floor. “Alright then Star, what’s your guess-ack!”

Giggling, she had captured his cheeks in between two of her fingers, and was pinching and pulling on them like they were made of taffy instead of his skin, oblivious to his discomfort. “Tom, you must be from... _ the cutie kingdom!!” _

“Tha cuthie kin’dom?” Tom echoed back, his words mangled by the attack his face was under. “R’lly?”

“Really!” Star laughed, releasing his face with a gentle pat of her hands. She went to pull her hands back when Tom suddenly slapped them under his own, keeping them pressed flushed against his face. 

“Star…” It was her turn to blush as he quirked a brow flirtatiously at her, and purred with a wink, “I wouldn’t be the prince of the Cutie Kingdom...I’d be the  _ king!” _

“Tom, oh my gosh!” Star shrieked with laughter, attacking him with a flurry of slaps and punches, “That was lame!  _ You’re  _ lame! You’re the lame-o prince of Lame-O land, located in the Lame-o galaxy!”

Shielding himself from the onslaught of blows with his arms, Tom only inched closer to Star, trying to get in close enough to grab her flailing hands. “Hey now, Star! You didn’t let me finish!” He quickly ducked down low and popped up between her arms, encircling her in a hug and lifting her up into the air with a squeal. “If I was king of the cutie kingdom, you’d be my queen!”

She was still giggling like mad even when he set her down, her nose and cheeks and ears glowing pink and giddy. She was so cute, so beautiful wrapped up in his arms like this, a happy and silly mess, he just…. _ really wanted to kiss her- _

Suddenly, there was the sound of boots,  _ many  _ boots, coming from beyond Star’s door, their stomping only growing quicker and more frantic with each passing second.

Tom had barely time to process the noise before Star was the one lifting him off of his feet now, and running over to the portal that still swirled open in her room.

_ “Call me!!!”  _ Was all she cried as she lifted him high above her head, as if he was nothing but a stuffed animal, and chucked him on through, the portal closing just as he heard her bedroom door slam open.

Star turned from the spot Tom had disappeared only moments ago to face the literal army of guards in her room, a sheepish smile twisting her face.

“Uh...hi guys!” She tried with a cheerful wave of her hand, their angry and exhausted eyes not lost on her. “You’re all looking... _ well-rested.” _

The guards said nothing in response, only split into two groups down the middle so that they could make an aisle for…

“His Majesty and Her Royal Highness, King and Queen Butterfly!” announced one of the guards, though Star found it completely necessary. She knew they were coming… she knew  _ what  _ was coming.

Her mother and father appeared before her in their royal bedrobes, dainty slippers upon their feet. Her father was grinding his teeth like a warrior would a battle axe against stone, his knuckles popping like coals from where he kept his arms crossed tightly over his chest. Her mother, though, was still the perfect picture of grace and poise… or so it seemed at first.

As she stepped closer, Star saw a single vein throbbing angry and thick above her mother’s perfectly manicured brow, the only crack visible in her calm demeanor.

“Star…” 

The Queen’s voice was the same cold blue as the diamonds on her cheeks, and Star turned away, wilting like a flower under the frost.

“Yes...Mother?” And her voice was so quiet, so contained, no one who knew Star would ever think it was actually her who had spoken. Except for Moon Butterfly, of course.

Looking down at her daughter over her gentle slope of a nose, she simply stated, “For breaking curfew, you are to be grounded...”

“FOR A WEEK! A WHOLE WEEK!” River boomed from the doorway, finally losing his battle with his temper. “YOU’RE LUCKY IT’S NOT FOREVER, YOUNG LADY, IF I HAD MY WAY I’D-”

He stopped as the Queen slipped past him, silent and graceful as a shadow, the problem already solved  He pointed a shaking, indignant finger at Star, as if he could shoot her with a lazer through it, and followed suite with his wife, muttering a string of curses under his breath.

Star kept her eyes trained on the floor as she listened to the guards file out one by one, and when she finally,  _ finally,  _ heard her door click shut, she threw herself backwards onto her bed with a groan, her arm flopped over her face.

Then she began to shake, and it seemed she had begun to cry...but when she threw her arms up in the air to pump her fists in victory, only a smile was to be found on the princess’ face.

“Worth it!” She cheered, careful as to let not her parents hear her, let them know they could not destroy the happiness Tom brought her.  “Worth it, worth it,  _ worth it!!!” _

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Honestly, I worked and reworked this chapter so much, but a part of me is still a little unsatisfied with how it turned out. I hoped you enjoyed it, though!  
> Turn in next week to see where Star and Tom's relationship goes from here!


	6. Hold Your Tongue On Holding Hands

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Ponyhead is baffled by how hard and how quickly Star has fallen for the demon turd from the concert the other night. It's dumb, it's wrong...but it makes her bestie happy, right?

 

“Wow girl, so you really got yo’self grounded just to hang out with Tom like that? Mmm, he must really be somethin’, huh?”

“Oh Ponyhead!” Star sighed dreamily to her bff from the other side of the mirror, her cheeks warm with blush from where she held them in her hands, “He is the _something-ist!”_

Ponyhead whinnied loud and shrill with laughter, shaking her head in disbelief at Star’s lovestruck swooning. She had always known her to be the type to fall quick and fall hard, but this? This was something entirely new even for Star’s usual crush-crazy standards.

She had originally called Star up to ask her to hang out that night, maybe hit up the Bounce Lounge to _par-taaaaay!-_ but she had barely greeted her with her usual “Hey Home Fry-” when her bestie began squealing with jubilation, her hands flitting like crazed birds in front of her face.

“OH MY GOSH, FLYING PRINCESS PONYHEAD!! I HAVE TO TELL YOU SOMETHING! NO, WAIT-LOTS OF THINGS!”

Her unicorn ears had perked up with interest at once, knowing Star only used her full name like that when she had some real juicy news to share, and practically squished her face up against the mirror as if it bring her closer to the details. She’d often been told that if she had been born with a stomach, it’d be growling for gossip all of the time, and she couldn’t even try to deny it wasn’t true.

“Ooooh, girl! You got some beans to spill, huh? Spill those jellybeans, Star! I’m _huuuuuungry!”_

At this point, Star had also pressed herself flushed against the mirror, bringing the two princesses nose to snout, their mouths fogging up the glass with their eager proximity. Star held a trembling, half-hearted finger up to her lips, though whether she was trying to silence Ponyhead’s loud cheering of “Spill! Spill! Spill!” or quell the laughter that was choking up her own words, it was hard to tell.   

“Okay, Ponyhead! Okay, okay, okaaaay!” She finally wheezed, taking a deep breath that wobbled around the edges with barely concealed giggles, “Let me tell you...about Tom.”

And unfortunately for Ponyhead, tell she _did._

Ponyhead could hardly believe how much Star had to say about the demon boy after only a single date, having enough intel on him to seem like she had been stalking him for years.

Of course she described how _so freakin’ adorable!_ he was first. She described how his fang looked like a little snow-capped mountain peeking out from over his lip, and how handsome and mature his face looked in the glow of his fire. And he wore only the coolest clothes, they were _all spiky and cool like his cool and spiky hair_ and oh! How exciting it was it that they both used the same brand of black nail polish-could she believe it???-, that Tom was _sooo cooool_ for someone who was _sooo hooot_ (even when she stressed to Star that yes, she understood the joke there, and no, it wasn’t funny, the Mewni princess still went on to explain why it was funny anyways).

By the time Star was only _half-way_ through describing her date with Tom, Ponyhead felt like she had been there herself, that she also had known Tom all her life. If not for Star, how else would she have known that Tom preferred punches to kicks? How could she have gone on with her life without knowing  Tom didn’t just tear straws neatly from the wrapper, oh no, he banged them on the table just like Star did, hard enough to rattle the plates and spill over cups, that Tom couldn’t blow gum bubbles because his fangs always popped them, that Tom’s favorite animal was warincorns too, because they were dark and mysterious like him!

How could she... _still be listening to Star ramble on about this turd, omg…_

“Oh my gooooosh, Star! You got it baaaaad! Just lookit youuu~!” Ponyhead interrupted with the brightest smile she could muster through her suffering, just as Star was describing how sweaty Tom’s hand had felt when he went to hold her hand, which was apparently like her hand was getting a hug from a cute, warm slimy slug. Willing herself not to audibly gag and hurt Star’s feelings, Ponyhead desperately pushed on, voice shrill “So what, you’ve been grounded for two days now right? You haven’t seem him since, huuuuh?”

Star seemed to visibly deflate like a balloon at the question, turning her shining eyes downwards with a pout. “Well, no…”She sighed, combing her hair over her shoulder and running her fingers through its plush waves. “I haven’t…”

And for the first time in what seemed like hours, she fell silent in her misery.

With a sigh of relief, Ponyhead finally saw her opportunity to ask Star if she wanted to sneak out to hang out for the night, the occasion certainly not being a first for either princesses, but she stopped as a different kind of smile stretched its way across Star’s face, as sly and dark as a shadow. “But…!”

Pursing her lips together in confusion as Star chuckled devilishly to herself, Ponyhead used her horn to conjure a question mark of sparkle and light, catching her friend’s attention. “Ummm, but what, girl? You scarin’ me smiling all creepy like that.  It’s weird. You’re weird!”

Star leaned in close and beckoned Ponyhead to do the same, who complied with a roll of her eyes. Star’s eyes darted around her room, checking for any unwanted eyes or ears, and when she seemed satisfied that there were none, whispered from behind her hand, “I’m sneaking out with him tonight…heehee~!”

Ponyhead, _the_ Flying Princess Ponyhead, was for the first time at a loss for words and could only balk at Star as she pumped her fists in triumph. It was one thing to sneak out together, they had been busting out from their cribs and wandering off together even as babies, had ditched lessons on princess etiquette time and time again just to eat snacks or oogle boys when they were a bit older, and even now they’d break the other out from a grounding for a few stolen hours of fun. But it was no big deal, it never really had been, and that’s because they trusted each other, actually _knew_ each other. They were best friends. But Star and Tom…?

Star might already know enough _about_ Tom to talk about him nonstop for nearly two hours, but after only one date, did she truly know _him_ just yet? Could she really trust a demon like that so easily? How could she be acting so...well, dumb?

Ponyhead had never been one to hold her tongue, not with her subjects, not with her father ( _much to his annoyance)_ and especially not even with Star. Her bestie was probably one of the few people who did not hate this aspect of her personality, appreciated it even, who did not try to silence her when she had something she wanted to say. Even if it was something less than kind or mature, Star always listened to her with open ears and an open mind, and though Ponyhead was too cool to ever say it out loud...it meant the world to her to have that in Star.

Confident that Star would know she wasn’t trying to be mean, that she was only looking out for her bestest best friend in the world, Ponyhead opened her mouth to voice her concerns when there was a sudden whoosh of light and sound from Star’s side of the mirror, startling her into a shrill scream instead. Star on the other hand was not alarmed in the least, and simply  twirled to look behind her, her arm raised high in the air in greeting.

“Hiiii Tom! Yeah, I’ll be ready in one second, just let me say bye to my bestie first, okay? Cool, thaaaanks!”

When she spun back around, Ponyhead was taken aback by how happy her friend looked, the way she pratically glowed with delight. “He’s here, Tom’s here!” She squeaked quietly enough for only Ponyhead to hear, biting her lip to muffle her rising excitement. “I gotta go now, okay Ponyhead? But maybe we can go out together tomorrow and have a sleep over after! Okay?”

Ponyhead regarded her skeptically, her tongue heavy with the weight of words unsaid. She wanted to ask Star if she was being for real right now, was she really sure about going out with a demon of all things, and if she was totally completely sure she could trust Tom like this. Was he worth the risk of not getting her wand if she was caught? Would he be worth the trip to Saint O’s?  But...she knew she didn’t need to ask any of those things because the answer was as plain on Star’s face as her cheek hearts. The way her eyes sparkled like rain falling through sunlight, her cheeks dimpled with the width of her smile...it was the most obvious, joyous _YES!!!_ If Ponyhead had ever seen one in her life.

Not wanting to be the reason that happiness drained from Star’s face, not wanting to churn up the same ugly feelings in her stomach that her mother did, Ponyhead let out a loud neigh in support, her horn sparking little red and pink hearts from its point. “Woo girl, yeah! Go ‘n get out with yo boy for a bit, have some fuuuuun!” She cheered, flipping herself in an enthusiastic spiral. “Yeeee-uuuhhh!”

Star laughed, flashing her a thumbs up as she began to backtrack away from the mirror to where Tom was waiting out of sight. One bouncy step, then two. “I will! Byeeee, Ponyhead! Bye-byeeee!”

And then with a _fwip!_ the call ended and Ponyhead was left staring at her own reflection, her false smile receding into a flat line.

She stared at herself blankly for a few moments, contemplating. Should she have said something to Star after all? Would Star really be able to handle herself if something went wrong? Was she really so sure about Tom? The onslaught of questions rattled in her skull all the way up to her horn, causing it to spark and spit in frustration. With a huff, Ponyhead stared more intently into the mirror, as if she’d find the answers in her own equestrian face.

After a few minutes of careful observation, one thing suddenly did become very clear to the unicorn princess.

“I look _soooo good!”_ she declared with a whoop of laughter, flicking her mane from her eyes with a confident flourish.

While Ponyhead knew very little of what the future held for her best friend, she at least knew she'd be a knockout in her own.

  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Writing Ponyhead is so much fun, I really wanted to do a chapter from her pov and how she feels about her bestie falling for a demon.  
> I know this one was a little short, but definitely be excited for next week as Star and Tom go on date number two, and things get a bit more serious.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


	7. Stealing Hearts and Stealing Tarts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> There's nothing more romantic than sharing sweets on a moonlit beach around the fire...unless the fire happens to be your date himself

“I don’t think we stole enough from those pirates, Star. What do you think?”

Star looked up from where she had been wiggling her toes in the sand, pretending that they were massive ravenous worms come to devour the innocent seashell people of the beach.  Tom’s third eye was just barely peeking at her  over the mountain of victory loot towering between them, but she could tell by the way it crinkled in the corners that he was smiling at her.

A finger placed in careful contemplation  upon her lip, her gaze flickered from his one visible eye to the stash between them, debating his remark. “I dunno Tom…”she wondered sarcastically as her hand snaked to the top of the pile towards the crown jewel of their heist, fingers trembling greedily, “I think our loot really... _takes the cake!”_

Star swiped a large slice of cake balanced at the top of the stash, watching Tom’s now visible face crumple into exasperation at her pun.

“So bad..!” He groaned, his words muffled where he held his face in his hands, “So, so bad!” But even then his shoulders were shaking with laughter.

With a wink she shoved the entire piece of cake into her mouth, three layers of cake and frosting and all, and mused with her mouth full, “Mmff- Tastes pretty good to me!”

  


They had agreed on robbing pirates that night, as the initial idea had been lost in the thrill of their first date.

“Pirates always have the best booty!” Star had cheered as Tom searched for a ship to open a portal on, hands clenched into excited fists. She had turned her attention to the corner of her room dedicated especially to all the treasure and weapons she had stolen from them, trunks full of shiny doubloons and jewels the size of her head. As the princess of Mewni, she didn’t especially need any more riches, but she just couldn’t help herself. They were just so... _shiny._

So enraptured she’d been by the sparkle and shine, she hadn’t heard Tom quip from behind her back, “Does that make you the pirate princess, Star?”

Catching only her name, she had turned and inquired innocently, “Yes, Tom?” and had been confused by the sudden steam puffing from his ears, the way he had sped walk into the portal with a hand clasped over his mouth.

But it turned out the ship Tom had teleported them to wasn’t just home to any typical pirates, but true to their name... _pie-rates_. Rather than  gold and jewels, they had found a totally different kind of treasure aboard the ship, and in Star’s opinion, maybe even better than what they had been expecting.

Chocolate chip cookies the size of dinner plates, fat with oozing chips. Brick-sized brownies that were black as velvet and just as rich with chocolate. Lush and fluffy cakes piled high with frosting as soft as feathers, adorned with sprinkles that sparkled not unlike actual jewels. Cupcakes, not to be outshone by their larger counterparts, sat just as tempting in large bouquets of colors and  scents, fruity and spicy and warm and sweet all swirling together in a delicious perfume.

And of course, pies aplenty.

Taking the haul itself had been in Tom’s words, punctuated with a wink, “a piece of cake!”. The crew had been asleep far below deck, resting before rising with the sun and their bread. Tom had opened another portal then, and giggling behind their hands all the while, the pair had rushed back and forth between the portal and the stash, their arms loaded with all the sweets they could carry, their noses tickling with the aroma of sugar and butter and warmth.

By the time they felt satisfied with what they had taken, the ship was bare save for a few stale loaves of bread and a stack of glossy, brick-like fruitcakes. _Blegh._

“They’re gonna be soooo mad!” Star whispered excitedly to Tom as they squeezed through the portal together, her mouth bent close to his ear as to not wake their victims. She liked watching the blush creep up his skin, from his neck to his ear to sit hot on his cheeks, and her smile was only more smug for it.

But he caught her by surprise when he swiveled his head her way, their noses brushing with the proximity, and suddenly her own face was the one glowing warm. “I know!” He breathed back, barely stifling a laugh at the thought. His breath had smelled like cinnamon, hot and sweet.

He had taken them to a beach off planet somewhere, the sand shiny and silver under the glow of the planet’s double moons. Star had ripped her boots off at once, eager to feel what something  that looked so magical felt against her skin. As she buried her toes into its softness, she was surprised to feel a tingly current run through her feet, and yelped with surprise. It hadn’t hurt, not one bit, but it had certainly tickled.

“What is this-”

“It’s magnetic.” Tom had explained as he plopped himself down into the sand beside the sweets, taking off his own boots with one hand and using the other to grab a jelly roll. Star was surprised to see he had claws, sharp and black, instead of normal toes, and tried her best not to stare. He didn’t seem to notice her bulging eyes as he clarified, red jam dripping from his lip like blood, “All the sand is magnetic, so there’s these um… electrical currents running from them, you know? That’s why it tingles. The currents.”

Star pulled her gaze from Tom’s feet to her own, brows pulled high. “Huh, really? That’s kinda neat!” She had been impressed by the sand just for how cool it looked, but now she could appreciate it for what she couldn’t see, its...hidden depths.

She felt the same way about Tom.

“That’s cool you know that Tom.” She had grinned at him as she sat down on the other side of the pile, stealing a cookie to munch on for herself.

She heard Tom snort, and mutter almost bitterly, “No..no it’s not.”

He had lapsed into silence then, and enraptured by the deliciousness of the cookie, Star had been happy enough just to stuff her face for a bit in silence.

And here they were now- Tom’s voice was no longer wavering with something dark, and Star’s tummy was happy and full with sugar.

She was having a wonderful time except for....a breeze rolled in from off of the sea, bringing not just the smell of salt but a cold chill, and she shivered. “Ooo!” She squeaked as her arms pimpled in the sudden cold, slapping herself into a hug to try and  ward it away.

Tom watched her in confusion, his cheeks bulging with a mouthful of brownie. “What’s-” he paused as a shower of crumbs spat from his mouth, and embarrassed, turned away to finish chewing before turning back around with a concerned look. “What’s wrong with you? Are you okay, Star?”

“Who, me? I’m fine, I’m fiiiine!” Star dismissed him with a frantic wave of her hand, but as she shivered in another incoming wind, admitted sheepishly, “Well… I guess I _am_ a little bit cold…” Her eyes widened in sudden realization as she stared back at him, and she quickly asked, “Aren’t you?”

Neither one of them had worn their leather jackets that night, the jangle and gleam of metal not exactly ideal for a stealth mission such as theft. Star had opted for a black corset dress she owned with soft and fluffy tulle in the skirt, but the fishnet sleeves did nothing to keep her warm. She was cute...but _cold._

But Tom’s arms were just as bare as her’s in his tattered black tank top, save for a clunky spiked bracelet strapped tight to his wrist, and she looked at him in worry. “Aren’t you cold, too?” She repeated, quickly standing and brushing off stray sand from the folds of her dress. “If you are, we can leave! I’m sorry to keep you out here like this if-”

“Star, Star, Star!” Tom interjected quickly, silencing her rambling as he rushed to join her side. “It’s okay, I’m okay! Really! See?” He placed his hand on her arm and Star was surprised at how pleasantly warm and soft its presence was against her skin. So nice it felt, she couldn’t help but lean into it closer.

“If anything, I’m the one who should apologize, Star. I never get cold like, ever, so it’s easy for me to forget that non-demons still do.”

Carefully, almost shyly, he slipped his arm over her shoulders to further envelope her in his warmth, and when Star responded by only snuggling closer into him with a pleased sigh, he slowly navigated them back to the sand to sit side by side.

His heart was hammering so hard he was afraid it would burst, the feeling only amplified when Star said with a giggle, “Aww, it’s like cuddling with a giant ol’ kitty! So nice and _warm!_ ”

He coughed into his fist, painfully aware that Star most likely felt his heart’s frantic pace with her proximity, and quickly offered as a means to distract her, “Uh, do you want a fire too? How about a fire? I am all about making fire!”

And with a snap of his fingers, a fire roared to life before them, washing their faces in its red and orange glow.

“Aww!” Star cried, her eyes gleaming with both the sudden light and gratitude, “So thoughtful! Thanks Tom!”

She had closed her eyes to rest her head upon his shoulder, and missed  how the fire Tom conjured burst high into the air in reaction. She couldn’t help herself, Tom just felt so... _cozy._

Desperate to keep his thoughts together and not lose his composure with Star right in his arms, Tom sputtered out the first coherent words he could think of to get a conversation going. “So, uh...Ponyhead is-your, uhh friend...who you were talking to before we left, huh? Is that right? Your friend Ponyhead? From that night we met, same Ponyhead friend?”

He cringed. _Smooth._

If Star had noticed his awkward delivery, she didn’t show it, only chirped happily from under his arm, “Yup, that’s right! But Ponyhead isn’t just my friend, she’s my BBFFPP!”

“Your... _what?”_

Patiently, Star dipped her finger into the sand and spelled it out for Tom, her letters large and loopy, her i’s dotted with hearts and smiley faces. When she was done with her handiwork, she beamed with pride at Tom, who was staring at the message in bewilderment.

Bestest Bestie Forever Flying Princess Ponyhead!

Not wanting to accidentally gouge one of Star’s eyes out with his horn, Tom opted for a half-hearted thumbs-up in place of a nod. “Uh... _huh.”_

Star continued drawing in the sand around the words, babbling excitedly all the while, “Me and Flying Princess Ponyhead have been friends for like, _ever!_ Since we were babies! Me and her do everything together. We go shopping, and dancing, and have slumber parties and make overs! We go to the arcade and fight monsters and take my dad’s carriage for joy rides! We always have so much fun when we’re together, and we always have each other’s backs, _always._ Not that Ponyhead has a back or anything, but you know what I mean! We always look out for each other, and will always help the other when she’s in trouble! That’s what friends are for, that’s why I’m so lucky to have her! She is my _very. Best. Friend!”_

Star finally pulled her hand back and smiled fondly at her handiwork. With little dotted eyes and rainbows over their heads, pictures of her and Ponyhead smiled back up at her, doing all the things she had just been describing. The drawings themselves weren’t that great, Star was a warrior after all, not an artist,but the love really shone through anyways.

And Star knew that’s exactly what they shared between them, love. Where the rest of the world, heck, even the worlds of other dimensions wanted to look down on them and call them outcasts, claim that they were too this, or too that (Star was too reckless, Ponyhead was too loud,) the two princesses always knew that in the other’s eyes, they were perfect just the way they were and never be expected to change.

Happiness swelled like a balloon in Star’s chest, yellow and light, and she turned to Tom with shining eyes. “What about you, Tom? Who’s your bestie? What are they like?”

Tom wasn’t looking at her. His face was trained straight ahead, not at the fire but over it towards the ocean. To Star, it seemed less like he was even looking at the horizon but somewhere far beyond it, somewhere gloomy and cold, somewhere that kept his mouth in a tight line and his eyes barren. Tom looked...Star had never seen anyone look so lonely in her thirteen years, and her heart squeezed in her chest.

“Tom…?”

He shook his head to signal that he’d heard her, but didn’t answer right away. Instead he pulled his knees up under his chin, and his eyes moving as slow and dark as storm clouds, cast a melancholy stare at her drawings.

“I don’t…” His voice was so quiet Star had to lean in ever closer to hear him over the roll of the waves, practically putting them cheek to cheek, but she didn’t care about that. What she cared about was how Tom was feeling, and how she could help. She knew that listening was the best she could do for him right now, and stared him full in the face to let him know that her ears were open, that she was _there._

He pulled his arm from around her shoulder to hug his knees, burying his face into the crook of his elbow. With a sigh that floated from deep in his chest, he began again, “I don’t have...a best friend.”

Star opened her mouth to quickly reassure him that it was okay not to have a bestie, that the bond was special and hard to find, that she had just been lucky to meet Ponyhead so young, as long as you had other friends to laugh and play and have fun with, you’d be okay-when he continued in a voice small with shame,

“I don’t even have _any_ friends…at all...Not one!”

Star yelped at Tom’s sudden shout, flailing backwards onto her elbow as flames rocketed him to his feet. His hands were balled into fists that trembled visibly at his sides, flames licking his knuckles from inside his palms. His entire body seemed stretched taut at the seams, from the bristle in his shoulders to the veins popping in his neck, and at his bare feet the magnetic sand had begun to melt and bubble around his claws. If it hurt him he did not show it, and Star found herself scooting back to escape the molten puddle as it grew with the intensity of his heat.

Confused, but not scared, not yet, she searched his face to find an answer to his sudden outburst but found only an ugly fury. The whites of his eyes were gone, replaced with a seething red that illuminated from his skull, and his fangs were bared sharp and lethal from his black gums, opened in a ferocious scream that honestly, Star felt very grateful was directed at the ocean and not at her.

“Not a single friend!” He screeched, raising his fists as they crackled and popped with fire, fire that was slowly starting to amass into a large ball above his head.

Star took one step back, then two, as the meteor grew larger and larger in size, Tom’s fury growing right along with it. All that was growing in Star, though, was confusion.

What was this? _Who_ was this? Sure Tom was a demon...but he’d been nothing but sweet, nothing but charming since they first met! He’d been more Prince than demon before, to the point that she found it hard to believe he was actually a demon at all, but now, his body engulfed in fire, all she saw was a horrible demon. A _monster._

Where had Tom gone? Where had all this anger came from? Where-

Her eyes fell on the doodles she had made of her and Ponyhead in the sand, laughing and playing together, being besties, just as Tom howled, more in anguish than anything else,

“I’m alone! All alone! No friends... _nobody!!!”_

Realization it Star so hard, she was surprised it didn’t knock her off her feet.

_Oh._

She looked up from the drawings towards Tom, a fire of her own burning in her eyes. Gritting her teeth, she rolled up the netted sleeves of her dress and began to march towards Tom, determination moving her forwards where the intense heat hissed at her to go back, _go back!_

“Tom!” She shouted through cupped hands, trying to amplify her voice over the roar of the growing flames, of whatever violent noise was occuring in Tom’s brain right now. _“Tom!!!”_ Her blonde hair twisted wildly around her face in the scorched air.

So determined was Star, she didn’t even flinch as Tom’s head swiveled completely backwards on his neck to stare at her, his eyes flashing dangerously.

“Star...go away!”

His voice rumbled as low and foreboding as thunder, but she did not waver. Jutting out her chin defiantly, she only stepped closer, her fists squared up high.

_“No!”_

The flames around Tom seemed to double in size at her defiance, feeding on the frustration she caused. With a disgusting creak, the rest of Tom’s body rotated to join his head, and was now directing the large fireball in her direction. “No?!”

Undeterred, Star held Tom’s stare. “No. You’re being dumb!”

“Dumb?!”

Her eyes didn’t leave Tom’s face even as the flames rushed out to circle around her, trapping her in a ring. She did not flinch as they brushed at her feet, her arms, embers drifting white hot past her nose. Even now, Star was not afraid. She couldn’t be, not when…

“I’m not leaving you, Tom! Not when you need me!” She clasped both of Tom’s shoulders in her hands, and ignoring how he hissed at her, how her palms sang with heat and pain, declared, “How can you say you have no friends when I’m right here, huh Tom? You’re my friend… I’m _your_ friend! You’re not alone right now, and as long as I’m around, you won’t be again! Okay?”

Star momentarily thought she had gone blind with how suddenly everything went dark, the surrounding flames burning out with a hiss of wind that left smoke drifting hazily over the beach.

She turned to see the ring was gone, and when she looked back, she found Tom’s head bowed against his chest, his hands holding only open air above his horns. His skin hummed under her hands, but no longer burned.

“Tom…?” She gave him an experimental shake, she would throw this boy into the ocean to cool him off if she had to, she really would- but realized there’d be no need for that when Tom  lifted his head to look at her.

His eyes swam with tears, and he was biting hard on his lip, which trembled underneath his one dominant fang. When he spoke, his voice was choked up and raspy,though with emotion or smoke Star couldn’t tell. “You...you’re…”

Rolling her eyes, Star pulled him into a hug, silencing him. “Of course I’m your friend, silly! I thought you knew that!”

She pulled away to slug him playfully in the arm, which he took with a yelp. Star _never_ pulled her punches, no exceptions. “Why else would I hang out with some lame demon if he wasn’t my friend?”

Rubbing at the bruise blossoming where Star had struck him, Tom chuckled, the sound wobbly with tears.

“I don’t know…”He sniffed, dragging an arm across his face to wipe at his eyes. “Because I’m cute?”

Star stared at his face, his eyes dripping mascara like black tears, his eyeliner smudged like war paint down to his cheeks, his nose the slightest tinge of red...and couldn’t help but laugh. She laughed so hard, she leaned into him for support that ended up into another hug, just shaking against him.

She was just so... _relieved._ Here was Tom. _This_ was the Tom she knew. And he was back with her.

Tom looked down at her in uncertainty as she laughed into his shoulder, then gazed in shame at the area around them. Her drawings had been swallowed up in the molten metal of the sand, as well as the entirety of their stolen snack pile. All that was left was the stench of burnt, blackened sugar...not a single crumb. His heart sank to rest in a depressed heap between his toes, squishy and pathetic.

Keeping her arm wrapped tight around his waist, Star joined him in surveying the damage. When she saw what remained, or rather, what didn’t, of the dessert pile, a look of disappointment flashed across her face, but when she noticed Tom’s own turmoil, she quickly nudged him in the side with her elbow, grinning mischeviously.

“It’s okay, Tom! That’s just the way…”

“Oh Star, please, no…Not another-”

“The cookie crumbles! Heeheehee~!”

Laughing along with her cleared his lungs of all the soot and ash that had settled deep within them, choking him, and he found that breathing was not nearly as impossible as he remembered.

  
  


The next day, Tom found himself stalking his prey down the halls of his castle. He kept his pace brisk as to not fall behind and lose sight of his target, but did not move so swiftly that’d he draw attention to his presence.

Toombs the skele-servant wouldn’t know what hit him, _who_ hit him...certainly not his own Prince.

This had to go just right. First time or no, Tom was not willing to accept any mistakes. Nothing less than absolute perfection!

Tom saw his window of opportunity open as his target came to a halt to polish the iron maiden in the west wing, whistling cheerfully through lips he didn’t have as he scrubbed away dried blood from its spikes.

“Master will be so pleased!” He declared with chattering teeth, swinging the torture device closed to find-

“Hellooooo there, Toombs! How are ya doin’ today, _friend?!”_

Master Tom himself standing behind the lid, a large and unnatural smile stretching his face, hand raised in greeting. The small skeleton let out  a scream of terror, and immediately fell to pieces, his joints popping undone one after another until he was nothing but a skull in a pile of broken bones.

Tom stared at what remained of the servant in disappointment, his hand falling limp at his side. That had gone….well, definitely not perfect. And he had done everything Star told him to do exactly…

_“If you want to make friends, Tom, just remember a couple of things! Be super nice, smile nice and big, and approach them like you’re already friends! That’s what I do, anyways!”_

After his little, well, _huge_ meltdown the night before, and he had explained to Star that in his kingdom, one of the rules was that the Prince wasn’t allowed to have friends, _ever._ And his father was quite the stickler for rules...

She had spat in disgust, and shaking her head vehemently in disagreement, quipped, “Jeez, what kingdom are you from again? The Meanie Kingdom Of Suckiness?”

Rolling his eyes, he’d only agreed, “It sure feels like it most of the time… congrats, Star, you finally guessed right! I’m the Friendless Prince from the Suck Kingdom!”

She had punched him hard in the arm again, this time hard enough to convince Tom it was broken, and smiling brightly, had reminded him, “No, you’re not friendless Tom! Remember? I’m you’re friend...we’re friends~!”

She’d be the first, and only friend he ever had, but Star was determined to help change that, to bring more happiness into his life. To make sure he never felt so bad he had to burn himself up ever again. She had promised him... _pinky-promised him._

The thought made something bloom in his chest nice and warm, and with a shrug, he nudged Toombs skull with his foot before heading back to his room with a pleased smile.

This was fine, this was okay. With Star by his side, he was sure he’d make more friends soon. And if not, well…

As long as he still had her, he’d be fine.

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Phew! A nice long chapter to sink your teeth into after the lull in last week's!  
> I'd been debating when would be the best time for Star to see Tom's anger for the first time, and I decided that sooner or later would probably make the most sense. And like most problems Star encounters, I wanted her to face it with a sense of "I can handle this, I can save him, no problem!"  
> Can she, though? We'll just have to see.


End file.
